Oregon technology hiring was essentially flat last month, and annual gains are now at their lowest level since 2010. Annual growth that reached 7.4 percent last fall slid to just 2 percent in February.

As always, I need to note that any one jobs report is just a snapshot, and an incomplete one at that. The state doesn't capture every single job that appears or vanishes. Still, these reports are very useful barometers of where Oregon is heading.

Growth in Oregon tech jobs is leveling out just north of 56,000 -- below where we were in the middle of the last decade, and well below the peaks above 70,000 that Oregon hit in the dot-com era.

Well, Oregon technology has some chronic problems that are well known, chief among them the lack of big homegrown tech companies and the tech industry's shift away from the state's traditional strength in tech manufacturing as production jobs went offshore.

In addition, some specific issues are weighing on Oregon:

Job cuts: Symantec, Siltronic and Xerox have all announced layoffs already this year. Not all the job cuts have taken effect yet, but they're symptomatic of a change in direction. Large companies with relatively modest Oregon operations are cutting back, or consolidating elsewhere. Sectors that are growing -- data centers, chief among them -- don't provide the volume of jobs (a big data center might employ 100 or so) to offset what's being lost.

Startup scale: 2011 was Oregon startups' best funding year since 2007 -- but the fourth quarter was a little disappointing. And while several companies (Elemental Technologies, Puppet Labs, Urban Airship and Janrain, among them) are emerging as strong businesses with a national profile, the new companies that Oregon is growing aren't big enough yet to replace jobs lost at larger enterprises.

There are lots of good news stories in Oregon tech these days, but when it comes to jobs there's just as much disappointment.